Colorado Highway 13; Craig, CO
Moffat County -The Colorado Highway 13 Reconstruction and Road Widening and Wildlife Underpass road safety project is located on CO 13 from north of Craig to the Wyoming border and includes improvements to reduce wildlife-vehicle collisions. Crews will be removing the temporary pavement that was placed during the winter shutdown period and will be preparing the road for permanent, full-width pavement. Paving, shouldering, guardrail, final striping, fencing and seeding will be completed this season.
During the 2021 construction season, crews worked on earthwork and excavation, construction of a wildlife underpass structure, multiple retaining walls, culvert removals and replacements, culvert slip lining, full depth reclamation of the existing asphalt, placement of new road base course, asphalt paving, shouldering, fencing, guardrail, striping, and signing.
In cooperation with Colorado Parks and Wildlife, CDOT designed the project to reduce wildlife collisions while maintaining wildlife movement connectivity, including an arch bridge underpass for wildlife to safely travel underneath the roadway, as well as a section of roadway that will be equipped with a wildlife radar detection system. The detection system will be connected to warning signage that will activate when an animal is detected entering the roadway.
High wildlife exclusion fence will guide animals to the underpass and radar detection area. During the 2022 construction season, crews will install two electrified wildlife deterrent mats (called ZapCrete Mats) on the project adjacent to the newly installed cattle guards on Moffat County Roads 38 and 40. The mats paired with cattle guards are in lieu of using larger wildlife guards. The wildlife radar detection system and ZapCrete Mats are the first of their kind being installed and tested in Colorado. Once the project is complete, a study will be conducted to determine the success of the detection system, ZapCrete mats, game ramps and wildlife fencing concept.
